A meta-analysis of economic valuation of ecosystem services in Mexico José Alberto Lara-Pulido a,⇑ , Alejandro Guevara-Sanginés b , Camilo Arias Martelo c a Research Institute for Equitable Development, Universidad Iberoamericana, Prolongación Paseo de la Reforma 880, Col. Lomas de Santa Fe, Álvaro Obregón, D.F., C.P. 01219, Mexico b Department of Economics, Universidad Iberoamericana, Prolongación Paseo de la Reforma 880, Col. Lomas de Santa Fe, Álvaro Obregón, México D.F. C.P. 01219, Mexico c Universidad Iberoamericana, Mexico article info Article history: Received 22 August 2016 Received in revised form 12 December 2017 Accepted 23 February 2018 Keywords: Literature review Nature economic valuation Environmental policy Environmental economics abstract This paper provides a comprehensive review of the literature on the economic values for ecosystem goods and services in Mexico. We analyzed 106 studies that estimated an economic value for any given environmental good or service in the country. In total, we coded and classified 352 values according to the Common International Classification of Ecosystem Services (CICES) and the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) ecosystem classification. We then estimated an econometric model to compare the value of different services in different ecosystems. We show that regulation services are more valuable than cultural and provisioning services, that wetlands are more valuable than forests and cultivated systems, and that deforestation for arable land is not cost-effective, because the regulation services of forests are more valuable than the provisioning services of crops. We also calculate the elas- ticity between the value of ecosystem services that forests provide in Mexico (in USD/hectare per year) and the supply of each ecosystem (in hectares). This elasticity is statistically significant and equal to À0.37. This estimate is relevant in policy terms, since it adds an economic rationale for conservation to other moral and philosophical criteria, especially in areas currently experiencing a high degree of deforestation and degradation. Ó 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Placing an economic value on nature may be a powerful policy tool since it makes invisible benefits from nature to society visible. When these benefits are invisible, there is a risk that policy deci- sions are made by assuming they have a value of zero or with a complete unawareness of their real value. According to TEEB (2009), making these values visible makes it possible to: (i) com- pensate those who provide benefits, (ii) modify subsidies that affect natural capital, (iii) internalize environmental losses by establishing rates and prices or enforcing regulations, (iv) create economic value through protected areas, and (v) invest in ecologi- cal infrastructure. In every case, more information on the value of nature enhances the policy making process. Even when economic valuation of ecosystem services is not the only way to inform pol- icy makers, yet is a simple way to communicate the value of nature. Significant progress has been made in recent years in the eco- nomic valuation of ecosystem goods and services as borne out by the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity project (TEEB, 2010b). Moreover, ecosystem services is a ‘‘rapidly emerging field, which generated over 2400 papers” between 1990 and 2011 (Costanza & Kubiszewski, 2012). Literature reviews and databases have recently been developed to concentrate and systematize the economic values of nature estimated by thousands of authors. For example, de Groot et al. (2012), provide global estimates of the value of ecosystems and their services in monetary units based on a meta-analysis of over 300 case studies. To our knowledge, the Environmental Valuation Reference Inventory (EVRI) (Environment Canada, 2016) and the Ecosystem Service Valuation Database (ESVD) (ESP, 2014), are the largest sources of information on the economic values of nature. The ESVD contains 1310 registries 1 drawn from 267 single studies, published between 1966 and 2010 (60% between the years 2000 and 2010). The EVRI database contains registries from 4571 studies published between 1971 and 2016 (70% in 2000–2015; and 49% between 2000 and 2010). This type of literature is usually concentrated in a few countries. For example, five 2 countries account for 26% of all ESVD registries and two for 45% of all EVRI registries. 3 The literature on the https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoser.2018.02.018 2212-0416/Ó 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. ⇑ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: jose.lara@ibero.mx (J.A. Lara-Pulido), alejandro.guevara@ibero. mx (A. Guevara-Sanginés), camilo.arias@ibero.mx (C. Arias Martelo). 1 Each registry represents one economic value. 2 USA, China, Spain, Australia and the UK. 3 USA and Canada. Ecosystem Services 31 (2018) 126–141 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Ecosystem Services journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ecoser